ARTICLES ABOUT TEA BRANDS BY DATE - PAGE 2

KOLKATA: Ambootia Group, the second-largest Darjeeling tea producer in the country, has just acquired Bush Tea for an undisclosed sum. The deal was concluded on Sunday after protracted negotiations for 10 days between Ambootia Group chairman Sanjay Bansal and Bush Tea owner Vijay K Awasty. Confirming the development, Mr Bansal told ET: "We have just concluded the deal. Bush Tea is regarded as one of the reputed tea export houses in the world. They are suppliers to all leading tea brands in the world like Tetley, Starbucks and others.

In a market where more and more young people are picking coffee over tea, two tea brands are battling for youth attention. There's Tata Tea and its 'Jaago Re' campaign that was a hit with both masses and marketers and was much celebrated for its sweeping integrated approach with its 'wake-up India' vote theme. The campaign nudged HUL's brew, the up-market Lipton Yellow Label to jump into some digital marketing warfare. Lipton took the heat up a notch ahead, earlier this year, with an online puzzle challenge to instill pride in Brand India by showing off to the world Indian smarts and further build on brand Lipton too. "Mental sharpness is a logical extension of the product's conventional proposition of freshness," says Vikram Grover, category head, beverages , Hindustan Unilever.

NEW DELHI: Duncan Goenka group, which is giving a boost to its tea products with foray into premium segment and green tea category, is in talks with the postal department to sell its products. The company which sells tea brands including Double Diamond, Sargaam, Shakti Super Shakti, Aaag and Runglee Rungliod, is investing around 10 per cent of its total turnover of Rs 180 crore for giving a facelift and re-launch of its different products. "We are in talks with the postal department for distributing our ranges through post offices.

NEW DELHI: In order to provide brand protection and curb duplication of products, IT, pharma, electronics, telecom and electrical goods manufacturing giants are approaching private detectives to safeguard them against Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) violation. "A number of global firms have approached us seeking help to stop IPR infringement. Companies are really taking the issue seriously. We expect number to grow further," said Kunwar Vikram Singh, President, Association of Private Detectives of India.

Aided by firm tea prices, Kolkata-based Tata Tea has more than doubled its consolidated net profit for the fourth quarter ended March 2008 to Rs 113 crore against Rs 52 crore during the corresponding period of the previous year. Income from operations rose by a mere 1.5% to Rs 1,176.8 crore. Excluding the effect of one-time gains, the pure operational profits have registered an increase of 211% to Rs 80.8 crore. The company reported strong sales in the branded segment across key markets.

AHMEDABAD: As tea production takes a dip, leading tea majors such as HUL, Tata, Sapat and Wagh Bakri seem to be facing pricing pressure. The jump in procurement price of tea in medium and lower segment is making things difficult for companies selling packed tea under this segment. The price of tea in this segment has increased by around 20-30% compared to last year. The prices have increased due to lower production and higher demand. Unlike last year, which witnessed 3% jump in production, tea production is expected to dip to around 920 million kg. "As the economy continues growing at a fast pace, the tea consumption is rising.

KOLKATA/MUMBAI: Tata Tea has acquired two Polish tea brands Vitax and Flosana from Premium Foods SA, a local company headquartered in Krakow, for an undisclosed amount. The acquisition, made through its subsidiary Tetley Group, catapults Tetley to the second position in the Polish tea market with a 10.5% value share and a turnover of $36 million. The combined turnover of Vitax, which is one of the leading players in the Polish speciality tea segment, and Flosana brands is $23 million, Tata Tea said in a release.

NEW DELHI: Tata Tea is eyeing more acquisitions, especially in the iced-tea category, as it makes a shift in its positioning from tea to a complete beverage company. "We are moving from being a tea company to a beverage company. The category where we see a gap is iced-tea. It is not yet a big category in India but quite big globally. For our iced tea plans, we are looking at both organic and inorganic routes. While we are looking at acquisitions, there is still some time to go before we finalise anything," said Tata Tea executive director Sangeeta Talwar.

NEW DELHI: Tata Tea is eyeing more acquisitions, especially in the iced-tea category, as it makes a shift in its positioning from tea to a complete beverage company. "We are moving from being a tea company to a beverage company. The category where we see a gap is iced-tea. It is not yet a big category in India but quite big globally. For our iced tea plans, we are looking at both organic and inorganic routes. While we are looking at acquisitions, there is still some time to go before we finalise anything," said Tata Tea executive director Sangeeta Talwar.

KOLKATA: Launching tea brands in the international markets has traditionally been a forte of the tea producing companies. But a 100-year old company, Wagh Bakri Group, one of the leading packet tea players in western India, is set to enter the European markets with its flagship brand Wagh Bakri. The move to enter the European markets has prompted the company to set aside its plan to venture into new areas of business like food processing. Wagh Bakri Group is the fourth-largest packet tea player in India.